Gender of demented patients and specific family relationship of caregiver to patients influence mental fatigue and burdens on relatives as caregivers.

OBJECTIVES

To survey the burden and psychological problems of family caregivers of demented people.

DESIGN

All scores were compared according to gender of the demented patients and which family members were the caregivers.

SETTING

Outpatients clinic at the university hospital and the day service system for the elderly.

PATIENTS

Sixty-two demented patients living at home and family members acting as caregivers.

MEASURES

Cognitive function, activities of daily living (ADL) and behaviour of demented patients were rated using the Hasegawa scale, the ADL scale and the dementia behaviour disturbance (DBD) scale. Caregiver's burden and mental fatigue were rated using a burden scale and a general health questionnaire (GHQ).

RESULTS

Caregiver burden correlated negatively with the Hasegawa score and positively with the GHQ and DBD scores. Caregiver burden, GHQ and DBD for male patients were significantly higher than for females. Little difference was evident for caregiver burden scale or patient DBD between spouses and offspring as caregiver, but the GHQ score for spouses was significantly worse than that for offspring.

CONCLUSIONS

The difficulty of caregivers in supporting the daily life of demented family members correlated with patients' cognitive impairment, abnormal behaviour and ADL status, and caregivers' difficulty resulted in mental fatigue. Caregivers' relative isolation from friends, attributable to their caregiving responsibility, did not correlate with the demented person's cognitive impairment or ADL status.